The Journey of the Huntress
by Stephanie-J-Jensen
Summary: Being the child of the Bat and the Cat was never going to be easy for any child, especially in a world of villains and vigilantes. Treading the fine line between the two is a journey that Helena Martha Wayne is going to have to take with the Bat Family behind her and the family name in-front of her.
1. Chapter 1

Do you remember that day? The day that Metropolis was almost grounded, well, flattened more like, to nothing but a pile of rubble that could have resembled the likes of ancient Rome or Greece? When the Gods came to play among the lowly humans of that city, I don't think they considered the death toll they would rise. The families they would break apart. The trauma they would cause to children who lost parents or wives who lost husbands. The site of the hero of Metropolis crashing into building after building, smashing glass, obliterating lives was one that would haunt many minds for years to come. It sounded as if the whole world was caving in, that an earthquake was literally happening in the skies above the once safe city. Most people, however, forgave the sky god within months, saying that the lives of the few outweighed the good of the many. But try telling that to the young girl who almost and did lose her entire existence that day. To have the life you knew, the safe life, ripped from under your feet within the space of hours.

I was an eight-year-old girl that day, waiting patiently with my mother in the clinical cafeteria of Wayne Enterprises. Complaining at her, probably, that it was her fault that Daddy was late, again, that the journey from Gotham was her fault, that she didn't care, that my whole life sucked because of her. It was handover day. The day every parent dreads. Meeting the ex, handing over your most precious possession with guilt ridden hands. To me, it was the stark reminder that even though I had all I could wish for at my fingertips, I didn't have what I really needed. A stability in the knowledge that my parents loved each other. Or that I would come home to one of them, not a babysitter or a butler, and a smile with a warm meal and a chance to sit and do homework with an interested parent. I was a burden to both adults in my life, I knew that. They knew that. Even if I was affectionately named kitten by one and sweetheart by the other. That, and I hid their secrets that you wouldn't trust the FBI with, never mind a little girl with serious attention seeking tendencies. Do you know how many times they would play 'Well my Daddy…" and I would have to bite my tongue? How easy it would have been for me slam them all down with four words about either parent? I digress, I'm a bitter woman, if you couldn't tell that already.

The cafeteria, no, the whole construction shook with a loud boom that rocked its very foundations. Mom was apprehensive, more than that, intrigued and when mom was intrigued, you needed to be worried. Her green eyes scanned the windows, not getting up just yet, but that little crease in her forehead, just between the eyes, was signal enough to me that I needed to be on guard. Something was coming. I can imagine my little jaw setting firmly or a full bottom lip trembling in fear. I say imagine, because I'm not 100% certain, I tend to burry things deeply when I'm traumatised.

"It's okay kitten…they're probably doing something really fun in the science department…"

Her voice always fell from her mouth like butter as she took my hand and smiled gently. Encouraging me to finish the milk she'd bought with a nod. And I did, tentatively. On edge. Waiting to run for cover. Jesus, I was from Gotham. I spent some of my time in her run-down apartment in the oldest part of the city. I knew when danger was imminent. That was one of those moments. Still, she sat there, blowing the hot steam from her coffee, taking a sip with full lips in the most beautiful way you could imagine. Elongated fingers wrapped around the white beaker, red nails tapping the porcelain and eyelashes almost hitting the rim of the cup. That was my mom. She could make anything look like sex. As an eight-year-old, I didn't get it, but as I got older, I understood why men stared the way they did, or why she had dad where she wanted him most of the time. Only when that boom crashed a couple of ceiling tiles, did she stand up, on edge, ready to pounce into action. She watched as a building fell a mile away, the sonic sound and the dust that had emitted from crumbling concrete filled the streets in seconds. People were screaming, running to either watch or headed for the stairs in sheer terror. The phone was in her hand, dialling numbers in so quickly as she tapped her foot in agitation, that bottom lip caught in her teeth as she listened to an engaged tone.

"God damn you…." She growled under her breath, holding the phone in one hand as she rammed things into my bag, swinging it over her shoulder. "Helena, come here."

She held out her other hand and I took it, squeezing on tightly, not one question asked as she dialled again, and still, not one answer as the carnage outside of the window continued. It was now almost black, thick blackness surrounded the building. Screaming and crashing continued both inside and out.

"We're going to run, Hel, remember, how we practiced…." She said without passing a green-eyed look at me. Her mind was in survival mode, and when that happened, there was no comfort for her petrified daughter, that would come later. She didn't get the chance as the building shook so hard, that tiles began fall from the ceiling around us, throwing us both under a table as her phone finally rang through, the growl in her throat had become a softer one, one laced with both annoyance and fear. "What the hell is going on out there?"

The muffled voice at the end of the phone was the one we both needed at that point in time, her eyes noticed mine, crying was not something that her daughter did, but when she did, it was always her father's duty to deal with them. The speaker phone was activated as the crashing tiles and shaking floor continued around us.

"You both need to get out of that building…. NOW…." His growl was one of frustration, one because he was unable to get to us fast enough and he knew that. Even if mom was totally capable of finding us safety, it would be angering him to hell to know he was unable to reach us before our worlds collapsed around us.

"Daddy…." My voice broke its silence, integrated with sobs and more over with that high-pitched cry no father needs to hear from his little girl. "Daddy…. it's going to crash…. it's going to fall…" I screamed, screamed as the glass blew out of the windows and flew across the room, showering both of us and those around us. Many of them laying unconscious on the floor, pouring out blood, moaning, screaming and crying worse than I could at that time.

"Helena, listen, I'm coming for you now, a few minutes and I'll be there, get your mother and go down the stairs…don't use the elevator…. the stairs …. okay… you got it …." He was attempting to lie through to create calmness, but it wasn't working. I knew it was more than bad, a fear had set in that man's heart, one he had not really had to face before.

"Yes… I will …. I promise…" I observed around me, mom was there, comatose, blood driving from her head, covered in dirt, wreckage and lead glass. I tried with all my strength to shake her awake, to make her look at me as I cried out in fear. "Mom…wake up…we need to run…." I was pleading, I remember that, begging for her to live through this, just in time for dad to get there.

"Hel, sweetheart, run… you need to be brave … run …" he shouted down the phone as the signal began to break, as if he understood what was happening in that moment in time.

I did, I grabbed my bear, tightly and darted for it, the lights flickering as I sped through the darkened building. Down stairs, missing a few and stumbling, cutting open my hands and knees. But I couldn't give into the pain, even at that age I knew not to let it rule me as I got out. Into the dust filled air of the street below. All I could do was look up, helplessly, as most the building began to crash about myself. Stunned that my mother was now trapped inside that rubble, helpless, unable to defend herself. I couldn't even find it in me to grasp the special awareness I needed. Rooted to the spot, not able to see the danger I was in. But he did, luckily for me. In that moment, right at the very second I needed him to be there. Not wanted him too, but needed him too. Scooped up in two arms as the concrete beam hit the floor and not me. Placed on the broken ground again in front of him. Made to look into the eyes of the man that had made me. The ice blue pools that matched my own.

"Where is your mommy, sweetheart?" he was angry, but in that anger, I found the comfort and strength I needed as I looked up and pointed to the building that was once Wayne Enterprises, Metropolis Division. He pulled me in, trying to hide me from the trauma and devastation he would always be reluctant to let me be part of from that moment on. "It's okay Helena …. I promise …. you're going to be okay …."

For years to come, Bruce Thomas Wayne would keep that promise to that little girl, keep her safe, sheltered and protected from the hell of Gotham. Yet in turn, it would push a giant void between father and daughter. Create an anger in him that he would never be able to control. Because, even though he had saved my life, he hadn't been there when the disaster began. No matter how fast he drove or how angry he became. The spiral began at that moment. A spiral we would try our damned hardest to save him from.


	2. Chapter 2

For the next few hours at least, I clung to that man, refused to leave his side for a single moment. For one of those very rare instances in my life, he allowed me too. Carried me around like a teddy bear, my arms hung around his neck and my small head in his shoulder. Bruce Wayne, the saviour of the day. The memory of that man was the man I would always cling to when I became frightened, rebel against him when I was angry, seek his protection when I was in trouble. I was both heartbroken and angry. Angry that even as a young child I had not been able to save my mother from the fate I completely believed had befallen her. There were no tears, not any more, I was becoming an adult that day, too soon in everyone's eyes. But the path for my life had already been set upon now. The injustice I witnessed that day was something I would never forget as long as I lived. If Superman was a good guy, how much destruction could the bad guys cause.

He sat there as the paramedics pulled glass from my hands, face and arms. Bandaging up my cuts, stitching up what needed stitching as I screamed in absolute terror and more pain that I had ever been exposed to at all. I wanted to hit out, lash out, but being pressed against his chest, where the streams of tears would ruin his shirt as he tried to console the screaming child in his arms. He couldn't even muster the words to tell me to be brave, he knew it was far too much to ask of me at that time. He let me scream out right up until the point I had nothing left.

Eventually, I fell asleep like that, only then did he pick up the phone. Even in my sleep I could hear his voice growling down the phone. The anger in his voice was given in to devastation at the thought he was now a single father to a child that carried his DNA. Of course, there were other children he had been responsible for before me. They boys who resided at Wayne Manor were brought to him to be trained in the ways of the Bat. Not me. Not his little girl. He had no idea how to deal with the upbringing of a female. Up until that age, I had been an angel, but now, now I was changing, becoming more like either parent that he couldn't deal with it.

"Alfred…I need you to come to Metropolis… Selina's daughter…." He gruffed down the phone and then I stirred, shaking my head in complete disagreement. "I know…just…. she has no one else…."

"Daddy…no…please…can't I stay here…" I remember begging him, being completely against the idea where Bruce would be anywhere but with me.

"Helena, it's for a little while, I'll be home, I need to find your mother." He placed a kiss on my cheek and even if I wanted to argue, I couldn't. There was one thing you never won with Mr. Wayne, was an argument. "I'm coming home, it'll be a couple of hours."

Still, I fell asleep again, before the old Butler arrived. He held me close for a little while longer. Those arms handed me over into the safety of the car, curled back up on the back seat, still holding onto that bear with all I had. The rocking motion of the car on the road and the hour journey worked wonders on soothing my adolescent mind, calming the terror that ran around in my soul.

When I woke, it must have been hours later, it was now dark, the bedroom I had at the manor was larger than the whole of my mom's home. Although there was a bed, I'd apparently decided to move myself to the window, being contained in the smallest of spaces made myself feel more than safe. That, and Ace the Doberman was always fast to come and take care of his young mistress. I was always his main concern. He sat by me, and eventually, he fell asleep next to me. It made me feel a little like home. That at any moment, my mother was going to come through the door and take me with her, hold me against her and not allow anyone else to ever take me away from her again. Even if that was my father or the Supergod of the sky who had taken her away from me. It was the sound of a car in the driveway that had woken me, stirred me from my sleep with the crunching of the grey gravel under its wheels. The bright orange glow making me stir in that nightmare I was now living. It was followed by footsteps and the sound of movement and talking through the manor. The noise of the footsteps travelled up the stairs and the creak of the door alerted me to the man in the doorway. Ace had moved to sit up, growling at his master in the doorway before he knew who it was.

"Ace, down…." He commanded and the dog did just that, but not before he pressed his nose to my face. He then hit the floor, tottering away from me.

But I didn't dare move, I knew it was Bruce as he sat by me, the smell of aftershave and worry emitted from his every pore as I turned over to see him, looking at the man who was now obviously broken as he hunched over, head in his hands, the greyness in the pitch black of his hair had only started to show. He was aging, not that I knew that, or cared about it. But looking back at it, he was so stressed by every single situation or battle he found himself in. His hand moved, pushing my hair back from my face as I stared at him with a blank expression, those blue eyes cutting through his stare.

"Helena…come here…." He literally grabbed me, placing myself on his knee as a small yawn escaped my small mouth. "You do know, that you have family here, we all….love and care for you….a lot." His lips pressed on the top of my head and for some reason, as if I was a baby again, he began to rock me on his knee. "Your mother….she's…."

"She's dead…isn't she…" I dared not look him in the eye at point, I just continued to stare forward at the light in the doorway.

"No….she's not dead….but she is hurt…in hospital…." He saw the look of my face light up a little no doubt. The fact that my mother was alive was something to fight for. To go home to her. "You're going to stay here…for as long as it takes for Selina to recover…."

"Can I go see her? " it was a stupid question, but one I had to ask of him as it was the one thing I wanted most in the world at that point in time. "Please…she could be scared…."

"Sweetheart, trust me, it takes more than a simple building collapse to scare your mother. But soon, I'll take you to see her." He chuckled a little and sighed, content to hold me in his arms for the rest of the night.


	3. Chapter 3

When the light broke through the windows the next morning, much to my surprise, I was still wrapped up in those big arms of his. Curled up like a cat on his chest as he slept on the bed of my new bedroom. In my sleep, he must have managed to change me out of the dust ridden clothes and placed me into one of his old t-shirts, something, that as I grew older, I would come to cherish and hold onto for my entire existence. I sat up, looking around the room, wanting to be up but not wanting to miss another moment with the man I thought literally hung the moon.

"Helena…go back to sleep…it's too early…you have to go to school…." He assured me with that frown on his face that I often pulled when I needed more sleep than I could get.

"I can't sleep anymore…I need to eat…"

"Eat…yes…you're right…food is important…. when you're a child…" he moved and picked me up, taking me through the house and down to the kitchen where there was already a boy sitting at the table, he was at least fifteen, older than I was. But still, he was eating away at the table, as if he belonged there. "Helena, this is Jason…."

"Is he Robin?" I looked at the new boy in my life with an annoyed scowl. As if he was taking up my mantle, my job, my attention in life.

"She knows…the big family secret…. a five year old…." His tone was annoyed that someone else knew the family secret, one that was usually kept in the walls of the manor.

"I'm eight, actually…." I could feel my glare cutting through him with a stark reminder that this was my home and he was simply there by my father's good graces That's when he placed me in the chair and smirked, grabbing a coffee and leaning on the kitchen bench. "Where's Dickie? I thought he lived here."

"Always with Richard Grayson, one day, Miss Wayne, you'll marry that boy and carry on your father's legacy…" Alfred's voice cut through the room as he placed my pancakes in front of me with a small smile. He may have hated my mother, but I reminded him of Bruce, so I was allowed in the house and more importantly, in his good graces. "Now eat your breakfast…"

"I won't marry any boy, I'll grow old and live with cats…lots of them…" My fingers picked up a fork and I began to devour the food in front of me.

"Well, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree Miss Wayne." Alfred chuckled as did Bruce, for some reason, I was hilarious that morning. Maybe because they were completely unused to having a young girl in the house who had more confidence than her mother and father combined.

Then the phone rang in the kitchen, Dad picked up the belling handset as it cut through the morning peace. I watched him, watched his body language change from the relaxed domineer to an annoyed stance, standing up straight as he listened and took in every single piece of information. There was Batman, there was the Dark Knight. Not Bruce Wayne. He placed the phone down and looked at Alfred with a glare. "You need to get Helena ready for the day, she needs to come with me to the hospital."

"Is mommy okay?"

"Yes, Helena, she is." His body knelt infront of mine, that strong hand holding one of my small ones, engulfing it completely. "But we need to go and see her, and, I need you to be brave again Helena. You are a strong girl."

I nodded and in that nod was a promise as I got up and followed Alfred to my room, having him pick out the most appropriate outfit for the heir to the Wayne fortune. That black pinafore dress, white tights and blouse, patent shoes and pea coat. That was Helena Wayne, not Helena Kyle.

Gotham General was swarming with the press, waiting to get a glimpse of any commissioner or socialite who would make their way to visit loved ones effected by the tragedy that had hit Metropolis. We were fair game, complete fair game. They would love nothing more than a dishevelled Bruce Wayne and his bastard daughter in the hospital. There was a growl as he parked up the sports car, his face contorted before he took a deep breath, a smirk in my direction. He reached back and grabbed the bunch of lilies from the back seat.

"Helena, are you ready to say hello?" He asked me as he handed me the flowers. "These people are going to be very interested in who you are. Helena, you just smile and wave to them." He got out of the car and came around to my side, plucking me out of the car in his arms, making his way down through the flashing photography and shouts from the press. I was in shock, never had I been exposed to that amount of attention anywhere in pubic. I had been a secret up until that point. No one knew I existed until I was announced on the back of my injured mother.

"Mr Wayne…. I suppose you're here to see Miss Kyle…" A blonde lady doctor made her way towards us, smiling briefly at me and taking her gaze back to my father. "She's awake, she's a little confused, but she's well. Asking about her daughter, who I guess, is this young lady."

"Yes, it is." He agreed as she walked us through the clinical hospital, people were littered all over still, waiting for attendances, all looking rather ill and most of which were injured and bleeding. It was at that point in time that I had decided to fight against this, to be the justice that no one expected her to be.

We reached her room, Bruce placed me on my feet, holding tightly onto my hand as he opened the door, the beeping of machines and the small noise of a television in the corner alerted me to the fact that she was awake, taking in the aftermath of the events that we had been exposed to. As I peered from behind his legs, I saw her, bruised and cut up, but sitting upright a bright smile on her face as she saw her daughter.

"Kitten!" She wanted to stand, I could see that, but she was stuck as she winced at that small movement to swing her legs over the bed. "Come here…."

"Selina, you need to stay in bed. The Doctor…."

"Never mind what the Doctors say, Bruce, just give me my daughter." She glared a little but I moved, jumping up on her bed to sit by her, curled up with my dark hair spread on her shoulder as she held me tightly against her frail frame. "Oh sweetheart, I thought…." She gasped as she held onto the tears, choking a little in her breath. To me, beat and bruised in bed, she was still my mother, still the most beautiful creature in the world. No one would ever change the view I had of her.

"I'm okay mommy, I promise, I was brave."

"I know, you always will be, you are your fathers daughter." She kissed my head and held me tightly again. "I'm sorry, sorry I couldn't protect you."

"I'm sorry mommy, sorry I left you…"

"Helena…" Bruce mumbled and sat on the bed next to us, awkwardly taking my mother's hand and placing the other on my hair. "It's not your job to protect us, it ours to protect you, it's not your fault"

"But it is, just like you…." I looked at him, my brow furrowed, not able to understand the difference between adult and child. "I couldn't do it, I ran…"

"You did what you had too. We are both alive, well, and you are safe with your father."

"When are we going home Mom?" I looked at her. There was a silence as she looked between the two people in front of her, a look of upset on her face.

"Hel, baby, we need to talk, your father and I." her face upset but with a fake sense of calm about her as I looked back at the man in question. "I want you to be strong and brave a little longer. Mommy has to stay here a while."

"Then I'll stay with you…" I begged her no to disappear on me like she had before a few times.

"You have to go to school, you have to sleep in a normal bed and have a safe life." There were tears again from her as she refused to look at the face of her confused daughter. Her face became red and blotchy as I began to panic a little. There was something they weren't telling me at all, and I was becoming angry. That little temper began in my chest.

"No! No I won't!" I shouted at her and wriggled from her grasp, pulling away from her and Bruce's grasp, heading for the door faster than they could both react, running with all my might down the corridors, hearing the growl of a voice behind me as he ran after me, but I was too fast and he was becoming a little too old to keep up with an eight year old temper fuelled girl. I wasn't looking where I was going, my face red and full of the wet tears where I had cried out the anger on my escape. I tumbled a little, falling flat on my face. Completely defeated and embarrassed as I growled into the tiles on the floor.

"Hey, kid, what's wrong?" Richard Grayson, the voice from beyond, placed his hands under my arms and pulled me up, that face the one I would always see as my knight in shining armour, the one constant and unchanging figure in my young life "Nothing can be that bad Hel."


	4. Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4

Dick stood up in front of me, holding onto my hand tightly as Bruce came storming down the rest of that long corridor, my eyes looked up at him, begging him to protect me from the wrath of an angry

"You're alright Hel, don't worry about it, I've got ya." He assured me with a wink and squeezed my hand tightly as Bruce closed in, that look of anger on his face mixed in with relief and annoyance at the worry I had possibly just caused him to feel in the last two days. "You wanted to see me?"

"Yes, yes, I did, I need you to take Helena, for the day, I have things I need to discuss with her mother." He glared down on his unruly child before kneeling in front of me with a sigh, looking at the floor to compose himself before looking back up at me with that set jaw and blue eyes. "Listen to me, anything that happens between your mother and I today, you must promise never to run away again, it's not safe…"

"I'm in a hospital, I can't be harmed here, people are looking." I was a stubborn little know it all, even at that age who would think nothing of sassing either one of her parents or how much it vexed them.

"It doesn't matter, its happened before, people get hurt in hospital. You know my secret, that makes it easy for you to be taken here. You don't want that, do you?"

"No Daddy." I looked at my shoes and pouted with every bit of that mouth before he pulled me into his chest, his chin on my head, engulfing me for a split second before pulling away.

"Be good for Richard, and I'll be home tonight to read a story." he was a little softer now as he stood up and patted the younger man on his shoulder, that small smile of mutual respect on his face for his younger counter part. "Make sure she's safe Dick."

"I will." He nodded and took me out of the warzone of the hospital, leading me by the hand to his car in the parking lot. Dick, even when I was that age, treat me like a mini adult. As if I he knew I could cope with a lot more than your average eight year old. "Helena, you're going to be okay."

"So, everyone keeps telling me." I glared at him as her opened the car door for and I jumped in, letting him belt me up before he got in the other side. "Where are we going?"

"I'm going to take you to see your Aunt Kate, she has a little girl your age, Jackie. You can hang out with her for the day if you want to?" He was hoping against all hope that the stubborn child of the batcat was going to comply to him without a fight that day, and he was sorely mistaken in every way.

"I don't want to, but you're going to take me anyway."

"You're not stupid, are you?" he chuckled lightly as he moved across Gotham in the car with me, slowly and steadily "So I hear, you're going to live with Bruce full time."

"I heard it too, but I don't know if I want too. "

"Why not kid?" he genuinely looked puzzled at my disdain at the idea of being locked up in Wayne Manor for the rest of my life.

"Because, he's always away. Just like mom. Then they always argue with one another, all of the time." The scowl I gave him was enough to make any man shiver, let alone one that I had under the thumb from the age of five.

"You know that's not your fault. Bruce and Selina, they always fight, but it's because they love you and each other. They're just too stubborn to admit it."

"They're stubbornness will get them killed one day, then I'll be an orphan, just like Dad."

"Helena, you're never going to an orphan, you have us all. You have a big family kid, and don't think for one second your old man is likely to be killed by anyone." He shook his head at my adult like behaviour before parking the car on the side of the building. This place wasn't too far from my mothers, a couple of blocks over in the same part of Downtown, although, it looked a little bigger than my mother's Brownstone building. He looked up at it and then back at me "You have to be nice."

"I don't have to be nice to anyone, polite, yes, nice, that's different." I smirked at him and he chuckled a little.

"Well, polite then." He shook his head and moved out of the car, moving around to let me out and take me up the stairs to knock on the door. "Do you want anything from your mothers?"

"Whatever you can get, just, leave her some things of mine. I don't know if she wants them…."

"Helena..." he looked down at me with a slight sad look on his face before the door opened. "Zantanna."

"Dick, why are you…." She looked at him as if she had just woken up from a long nap, and she probably had, most of the people that Bruce knew, slept most of the day and did their work at night. Her eyes followed his nod as he indicated toward me. "Helena? When did you get so big?"

"I need you to look after her for a while, Bruce wanted me too, but I have to swing by Selina's and grab things, sort some odds out."

"I understand." She let out a small smile and opened the door wider, letting me inside with Dick close by me, his hands on my shoulder as I wondered inside, looking around the building at the collection of things she had collected in her time in Gotham City, not unlike the way my father did the same thing, collecting things that she had memories too. "Helena, try not to touch things., I know you're a curious kitten, but somethings in here are dangerous honey."

I nodded and I looked up at her. Kate was my father's oldest friend, I knew he had known her long before he became the Bat, when he was just Bruce. I inherently trusted her, with every fibre of my being, although, it took me longer than that to actually like her the way I did my mother.

"Come on, there is someone I would like you to meet." Her face smiled as she took my hand and led me into the kitchen of her home, A girl, the same age as I was, sat there, pens strew all over the table as she drew, too engrossed to look up at me. Her raven hair, tanned skin almost a match for my own, but she was smaller than me, her brown eyes a contrast to my blue ones. "Jackie, say hello to Helena."

"Hello." She smiled as she looked up at me. At that age, we hadn't seen enough or done enough to be the women we turned into. We were both still young and innocent, happy and almost contented to live with our mothers, until either father had too much of an influence on either of us. "Have you been to a funeral?"

"Jackie, be nice. Helena's been to see her mother in hospital." Kate glared and she went to the fridge, grabbing milk and pouring it out for me into a glass as I instinctively sat at the table to join her. "There you go, now, can you girls play nicely?" she rose and eyebrow and smiled a little at me and her own child. I nodded again, silence was my go to when I didn't want to be rude enough to warrant an adults disapproval. Jackie moved a piece of paper over to me then the pens with a small smile, and I couldn't help but smile back. I picked up the pen and began to draw with her, keeping my ears open for signs of talk.

"Dick, she's a lot quieter than I expected her to be…."

"She's not been around kids much, she's only ever had adults around her. Silence, is her way of coping."

"Not unlike her father then. She looks like him, a little, a lot more like Selina though."

"Oh, you have no idea how much she is like her mother." He let out a chuckle and came over to stand over my shoulder "Draw me something nice, and I'll be back soon." His hand messed up my hair and I growled at him as he left, pausing for a moment at the door "There you are kid, I was worried for a second."

"Did you just growl?" Jackie asked me with a small laugh and I nodded in response with a scowl. "Would you like to be friends?"

"I don't have friends. I have my brothers." I shrugged as the pen moved over the paper, not drawing anything in particular that day.

"That's sad, I do, at the school I go to." She shrugged at me with a small smile on her face.

"Do you not have siblings?" I rose an eyebrow as I looked at her. I didn't have friends, because at the Academy, I wasn't exactly the popular kid, not account of my mother being who she was and my pride in the fact that she was my mother and no one could say any different. I had been caught up in more than a couple of fights defending her, and on more than a couple of occasions, was almost excluded for those fights.

"No, I always wanted a sister though." She smiled at me and I smiled back at her with that rare Wayne smile.

I played like a child for the first time in a while that day, all day, and when there was no sign of Dick, Kate treated me like one of her own, feeding me, letting me take a bath with my new best friend and settling me down for the night in her room with her. And I fell sound asleep. It never mattered to me what traumas I had been through or what I had seen, sleep, was always a constant thing. Something I could depend on to get me through the nights. Although, for the most part, it would always be broken by some form of nightmare. That night, it was the laugh, the cackle, the white paint and tattoos that made me jump awake with a start. Breathing out in panic before a figure appeared at the door in my sleep ridden state. First in shadow as he blocked out what little light there was in the doorway before moving into the room.

"Daddy, why are you wearing the scary suit again?" I looked up as I rubbed my eyes, Jackie still dormant at the other side of me, her brown hair spread over the pillow and her face completely relaxed and trauma free.

"You can leave her here, I don't mind." Kate looked over at me with her beautiful face and raven hair spread around her shoulders like her own cloak. "She needs to sleep."

I shook my head fiercely in objection at the thought of being left here without either one of my parents at the time.

"No, she needs to be home." He moved over the room, picking me up as if I weighed no more than a ragdoll, my eyes now attempting to close again on his shoulder, ignoring the fact that the cape was in the way. That's always the thing that people seem to forget about the Batman, he's the protector of the innocent. So as much as those hands could be used to pummel a criminal to near death, they could also be used to comfort a child in the wake of losing her whole existence in the space of a few days. "She needs stability, something Selina can't provide right now."

"She's signed…" Zantanna stopped, knowing my brain worked at a higher rate than most kids my age and that having grown up with those adults, I understood a lot more than they wished or needed me too.

"Thank you, Kate." He nodded to her as he left the brownstone, placing me in the passenger side of the car, climbing in and speeding toward the manor through the darkness of countryside and the crash of the sea. I wasn't the first child to be driven back to his home for safety, nor was I to be the last to be added to the odd collection of people in the Bat Collection.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Those couple of weeks that passed were the longest that passed without the presence of the cat in my life, but the recovery she had to take was one that she refused to have me around at all and Bruce was more than happy to oblige. He, however, took the time to go back and forth to see her, the guilt that consumed him for the events of that day, no matter whose fault it was, it was his building and it was therefore it was his fault that it happened. He took far too much on his shoulders again, and the addition to a broody mini him moping around the manor, it was almost too much for him to take on. We did it though, managed to get that angry little girl settled and eventually after a couple of weeks, he sent me back to school, after I passed the various tests as fit enough to go back both physically and mentally. I don't think anyone fully understood the hell I went through at that school, not in the slightest, but like both of my parents, I was so good at hiding my secrets, that not one of them would catch on to the fact.

When mom left the hospital, it was a couple of days before I could go anywhere near her. It was a day when the rain fell hard on the streets, the traffic ran through Gotham and I was locked inside Wayne Towers with a pile of crayons and some form of assistant to keep an eye on me. She smiled and played with me, probably because she was paid to do it. Babysitting wasn't usually on the roster of things to do when you worked at Wayne Enterprises, so she probably took it as an easy day in the office, God, was she ever wrong to underestimate the eight year old flight risk at her side. I was, however, so engrossed with the pens and paper in front of me, something that I learned to love from my little witch, that I didn't notice her presence until she was in the corridor behind the glass, arguing, again, with dad. Arguing until she saw me look up, then I bolted. Bolted as did she, straight toward the child she hadn't seen in weeks, weeks that felt like years to me. You will never appreciate the presence of your mother more than when she is gone, the need to be in her arms was more than I can ever express or even fathom myself. Falling to her knees was all the signal I need to grab onto her tightly, my small arms around her as she grasped as tightly as she could.

"Kitten…you have no idea…." She took breaths between words as she refused to let me go. My face buried into her hair as it melded with my own. "Have you been a good girl?"

"No…not really…" I shrugged and lied, anything to have her take me home with her, even if it meant causing hell in the middle of the work place. "Are you better now?"

"Almost. You know mommies never get ill, we're too strong for that." She purred as she stood with me in her arms, there was something wrong, and I knew it more that she thought I ever would. "I need to tell you something. Something you aren't going to like."

"You mean about me living with Bruce?" The fact I used his first name in front of him was a sign that at that point, I blamed him completely for taking me away from her arms. "I thought it was just while you got better?"

"No honey, mommy has a lot to get sorted before you come home." She was attempting not to cry which in turn, made me cry fully. "Helena, listen, you are going to see me again."

"No…no I won't…" I didn't care that people were watching the scene unfolding in front of them as the crying became temper tears.

"You will, on your birthday, I promise, three short months kitten, and I promise you, your father will look after you until then. Then it'll be whenever you want too. You know where I am. I know where you are."

"I won't! I won't go and live there!" I screamed, screaming was my natural defence to issues at that age, as if I could scare them all away with that high-pitched cry.

"Helena Kyle, you are better than this, you are stronger." She placed her head on mine as she calmed the wildcat in her arms, running her hand up and down my back. "I will never abandon you, you leave your window open, you hear me?" she demanded and I nodded to her as I still cried on.

"Selina, give her here!" Bruce had obviously heard the screams from the corridor and came running to stop the scene unfolding. "Give me the child."

And she did, something that I never thought she would do, attempted to hand me over as I clung on for life before she broke my hands away.

"Put me down! Now! I won't go! You can't make me!" I kicked and scratched as best I could to get his grip to loosen. It was pointless as he held me firmly under his arm, taking me to the door, passing me off to a waiting Dick Grayson.

"Take her home, she's too angry right now." He looked at me with a mix of both rage and pity, like he had no right to be angry with me, but was more embarrassed at the way I had reacted, but what did he expect? That was the first and one of the few moments I hated that man with all I had. He turned and returned to the room where Selina had turned her back, probably to stop herself running and taken me with her. At that age, I didn't get the fact that her sacrifice was for me, and not her. She was willing to give up her piece of happiness for me, so that I could have the life she wanted me to have. It was in that moment, that my father comforted my mother, held her in the way he did me. It was one of the only moments I had known them to be in a room and not kill each other. It was for the betterment of their child. A mutual decision that I had not one say in.

"No! Put me down Dick!"

He didn't say a word as he picked me up in his arms, letting me scream out my two weeks of pent up anger and aggression onto his shoulder as he held me tightly against him. I think I screamed all the way from the top floor to the bottom as he took the elevator to the lobby where I had eventually turned screams into sobs and annoyance.

"Come on Hel, we'll go for a shake, and I'll tell you what's really going on, okay? You think you can be a grown up about it?"

I nodded and that was enough of a promise as he placed me on the floor, holding onto that small hand tightly as we walked to the nearest shake shack, which in Gotham, for some reason, was easy to find.

"You finished crying now?" Dick Grayson's eyebrow raised at my now red and less angry face but I still found it in me to scowl at him with a little anger as we sat in a booth at the back of the café.

"Yes…." I poked at the shake with a straw as his arms crossed before letting them go to lean on the table. "No, you can't have any."

"Sometimes, I worry about you, then you open your mouth and I know your fine." He chuckled and went in to take food from the plate in front of me, and I, like the angry cat I was, stabbed at him with a fork.

"Stop making small talk and tell me what's actually going on Grayson." I looked up at him and took my fork back to my plate.

"Jeez kid…" he rolled his eyes and rubbed the back of his hand in annoyance. "Bruce is taking you from Selina because he doesn't want you to be hurt."

"Hurt how?" I was never going to let this subject drop.

"By the bad guys. Like the time when you were younger." He looked at me with a frown, as if I didn't remember and it was all that haunted me at night. "Your mother knows some…odd…people."

"You mean with the clown?" I looked at the plate and pushed it away, somehow, it took my appetite to think on that situation.

"Yes, like that." He looked like he was sad for some reason as if it hurt him more than it changed my DNA or mental state.

"Moms more than capable to look after me, you know that. She would never let anyone near me. Bruce is just being his possessive self again"

"I'm not saying that. But there is always someone there, waiting to take you, to hurt you. With parents like yours, you know you're always going to be a target for every physco in Gotham Hel, which is why you must be careful. No running away."

"You need to teach me, to do what Daddy does, what you all do, then I won't have to run." I scowled and glared at him, that jaw set and eyes on fire with a little anger behind them.

"You're eight, in a few years…"

"Bullshit!" I cut him off, a little too loud than I should have. "You were my age when you trained at the circus." I growled and met the eyes of many a disapproving person at the language that spilled from my mouth. There were always two sides to my personality, the side which I gave out to my parents the public and then there was this Helena. The angered little brat who thought she owned the whole of Gotham, her family included

"That's the circus, not fighting on the streets of Gotham. You're too young."

"No, you all think I'm too young. I could be Robin, easily. But you all try too hard to protect me because I'm a girl."

"It's nothing to do with you being a girl, look at Barbara, she does this. It has more to do with you being Bruce's girl."

"I don't care. You need to show me, and I won't stop until you do. He can't protect me and keep me from this forever. I grew up in the Batcave, I know more about fixing cars and hand to hand combat then I do history and math"

He stared me down with that look on his face that meant he was angry but couldn't do anything about it, that he knew I would win the argument and wouldn't stop until he gave in to what I wanted.

"Just like your old man." He growled back and stood up "Come on then, it takes more than your angry face and a few magic gymnastic tricks to do this."

"Funny, that's what I thought you did." I retorted and followed closely behind him, ready to take on the world as I thought I knew it.


End file.
